Indian Journal of Forensic Medicine & Toxicology

Prabir Kumar Deb ¹, Rajib Prasad ¹, Dibayakar Chettri ¹, Rumi Maitra ¹, Anurup Saha ¹, Vivek Kumar ¹, Jagadish Biswas ¹

Affiliations
1 Dept. of Forensic Medicine, North Bengal Medical College, Darjeeling, West Bengal, IN

Abstract

In our country motor vehicle accidents rank on the top among all fatal accidents. An accident represents a major epidemic of noncommunicable disease in the present century. A total of 5806 medico-legal autopsies were conducted in the mortuary of North Bengal Medical College, Darjeeling, during three year study period, out of which 1685 (29.02%) cases were due to fatal road traffic accidents (RTA). Female were less involved than men with ratio of 1:6, The principal age group involved in fatal RTA was 21-40 years, 57.32%, and least involved were extremes of ages i.e. below 10 years, 3.62%, and above 60 years, 2.67%. The majority of fatal RTA were due to heavy vehicles (trucks, buses etc), 41.12% of cases followed by light vehicles (car, Jeep, van, taxi etc) 32.40%. Brain was found to be injured in a majority of cases followed by liver and lungs. The victims mostly died of head injuries alone followed by thoraco-abdominal injuries in combination with head injuries. Only 64.09% of victims could be hospitalized and rest of them (35.89%) either succumbed on the spot or died on way to hospital

Keywords

RTA (Road Traffic Accidents), RTIs (Road Traffic Injuries)

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